Quick Answer
Employees covered by Singapore’s Employment Act are entitled to annual leave (7 to 14 days, scaling with years of service), sick leave (up to 14 outpatient / 60 hospitalisation days a year), maternity leave (16 or 12 weeks), paternity and shared parental leave, childcare leave, and 11 paid public holidays a year — all after at least 3 months of service. Most parental leave costs are shared between employer and government, within capped amounts. MOM does not publish a specific fine schedule for leave breaches, but investigates complaints and publicly lists convicted employers.
Annual Leave
Employees covered by the Employment Act qualify for paid annual leave once they’ve worked for you for at least 3 months. The statutory minimum scales with years of service, starting at 7 days in the first year and rising by 1 day each year up to a cap of 14 days from the eighth year onward. Employees who haven’t completed a full year get a pro-rated entitlement based on completed months of service — periods of approved unpaid leave are excluded from that calculation, but the notice period counts.
| Year of Service | Minimum Annual Leave |
|---|---|
| Year 1 | 7 days |
| Year 2 | 8 days |
| Year 3 | 9 days |
| Year 4 | 10 days |
| Year 5 | 11 days |
| Year 6 | 12 days |
| Year 7 | 13 days |
| Year 8 and beyond | 14 days |
These are statutory minimums — many employers offer more generous leave as part of their benefits package, particularly for PMET roles. Whatever you offer, it needs to be set out clearly in the employee’s Key Employment Terms; see our Employment Act guide for the full KETs checklist.
🏛️ Source: MOM — Annual Leave Eligibility and Entitlement.
Sick Leave and Hospitalisation Leave
Paid sick leave applies once an employee has worked for you for at least 3 months, has informed (or tried to inform) you within 48 hours of being absent, and has a medical certificate from a doctor or dentist registered under the Medical Registration Act or Dental Registration Act. Entitlement builds up on a graduated schedule by months of service, and hospitalisation leave is not additional to outpatient leave — the 60-day hospitalisation pool includes the 14 outpatient days already used.
| Months of Service | Outpatient Sick Leave | Hospitalisation Leave |
|---|---|---|
| 3 months | 5 days | 15 days |
| 4 months | 8 days | 30 days |
| 5 months | 11 days | 45 days |
| 6 months and above | 14 days | 60 days |
💡 Employer Tip
Because hospitalisation leave includes outpatient days, an employee who has already used all 14 outpatient days in a year has 46 hospitalisation days left, not 60. Track the two pools together, not separately, to avoid overpaying or under-crediting leave.
🏛️ Source: MOM — Sick Leave Eligibility and Entitlement.
Maternity Leave
How much maternity leave an employee gets — and who pays for it — depends on whether her child qualifies for Government-Paid Maternity Leave (GPML). Both routes require the employee to have worked for you for a continuous 3 months before the birth.
16 weeks (GPML): applies where the child is a Singapore citizen. The employee must give 4 weeks’ notice — giving less halves the payment she’s entitled to. For a 1st or 2nd child, you pay the first 8 weeks at her gross rate of pay, and the government reimburses the last 8 weeks, capped at $10,000 per 4 weeks (total cap $20,000). For a 3rd child onward, the government reimburses all 16 weeks under the same per-4-week cap, up to $40,000 total, and you pay nothing.
12 weeks (standard Employment Act leave): applies when the employee is covered by the Act but doesn’t meet GPML conditions (for example, the child isn’t a Singapore citizen). The first 8 weeks are paid only if she has fewer than 2 living children at the time and gives 1 week’s notice; the last 4 weeks are unpaid.
⚖️ MOM Requirement
Dismissing or giving notice of dismissal to an employee during her maternity leave, without sufficient cause, is an offence — check MOM’s guidance before taking any action affecting an employee’s role while she’s on or approaching maternity leave.
🏛️ Source: MOM — Maternity Leave Eligibility and Entitlement. MOM’s page notes further enhancements to government reimbursement are planned — check for updates before relying on the current caps for long-range budgeting.
Paternity and Shared Parental Leave
For children born on or after 1 April 2025, fathers get up to 4 weeks of Government-Paid Paternity Leave (GPPL); for children born before that date, it’s 2 mandatory weeks plus a further 2 weeks at the employer’s discretion. Stillborn children qualify for 2 weeks. Eligibility requires the child to be a Singapore citizen, the father to be lawfully married to the mother between conception and birth (or within 12 months after), and at least 3 continuous months of service before the birth — adoptive fathers qualify under equivalent conditions measured from the date of formal intent to adopt. You pay the employee during his leave, then claim reimbursement from the government (for births on or after 1 April 2025) capped at $2,500 a week, up to $10,000 total. The employee must give you 4 weeks’ notice.
On top of paternity leave, Shared Parental Leave (SPL) lets parents split additional leave between them: 6 weeks for children born between 1 April 2025 and 31 March 2026, rising to 10 weeks for children born on or after 1 April 2026. The same citizenship and 3-month service conditions apply, and SPL must be taken within 12 months of the birth — by default as one continuous block, unless split by mutual agreement with you. Notice is 4 weeks unless you agree to less. You pay during the leave and are reimbursed by the government, capped at $2,500 a week for allocated SPL weeks.
📅 Effective Date
The 4-week paternity leave and Shared Parental Leave scheme apply based on the child’s date of birth, not the date of application — 1 April 2025 is the cutoff for the expanded paternity leave and the first SPL tier, and 1 April 2026 is the cutoff for the expanded 10-week SPL tier. Check which regime applies before processing a claim.
🏛️ Source: MOM — Paternity Leave and MOM — Shared Parental Leave.
Childcare Leave
Parents of a Singapore-citizen child under 7 get 6 days of paid childcare leave a year, capped at 42 days total per child across all qualifying years, and it doesn’t carry forward into the next leave year. You pay the first 3 days at the employee’s gross rate of pay; the government reimburses the remaining 3, capped at $500 a day including CPF contributions. For a non-citizen child, the entitlement drops to 2 days a year under the basic Employment Act provision, capped at 14 days total per child, with no government co-funding.
Parents of a Singapore-citizen child aged 7 to 12 (inclusive) get a further 2 days a year of extended childcare leave, fully government-paid and capped at $500 a day including CPF contributions. Unlike basic childcare leave, extended childcare leave isn’t pro-rated. If a parent has children in both age bands, total paid childcare leave across both schemes is capped at 6 days a year. Both schemes require at least 3 continuous months of service.
Public Holidays
Employees covered by the Employment Act are entitled to 11 paid public holidays a year — New Year’s Day, Chinese New Year (2 days), Hari Raya Puasa, Good Friday, Labour Day, Vesak Day, Hari Raya Haji, National Day, Deepavali, and Christmas Day — plus Polling Day when it falls in an election year, though that’s a one-off addition rather than a fixed 12th holiday. An employee loses holiday pay only if they’re absent without authorisation on the working day immediately before or after the holiday, or if the holiday itself falls within a period of approved unpaid leave; being on approved sick or annual leave around the holiday doesn’t disqualify them.
If a public holiday falls on an employee’s rest day, the next working day becomes the paid public holiday instead. If it falls on a non-working day for that employee (a Saturday, say, for someone on a 5-day week), they get either a day off or salary in lieu at their gross rate of pay. If you need someone to work on a public holiday, the default is an extra day’s salary at basic rate on top of the usual gross-rate holiday pay — or, by mutual agreement, a substitute paid holiday on another working day.
🏛️ Source: MOM — Public Holidays and MOM — Public Holiday Entitlement and Pay.
Tracking Leave Correctly vs Getting It Wrong
| ✅ Compliant | ❌ Non-Compliant |
|---|---|
| Track hospitalisation leave as inclusive of outpatient sick leave already used | Treat hospitalisation leave as a separate 60-day pool on top of outpatient days |
| Confirm which maternity/paternity regime applies based on the child’s date of birth | Apply the same leave figures regardless of when the child was born |
| Pay public holiday salary in lieu when the holiday falls on a non-working day | Skip holiday pay entirely for employees not rostered to work that day |
⚠️ Penalty Risk
MOM does not publish a specific fine schedule for leave violations. What’s confirmed is that MOM operates a formal channel for employees to report leave and salary breaches, investigates complaints, and maintains a public list of employers convicted under the Employment Act as a deterrent — being named on that list carries its own reputational cost, separate from whatever penalty a court imposes.
🏛️ Source: MOM — Report an Employment Act Violation and MOM — Employers Convicted Under the Employment Act. Setting up correct leave tracking from day one is easier than fixing it later — see our hiring guide and CPF contributions guide for the rest of your new-hire compliance checklist.
Frequently Asked Questions
How many days of annual leave must I give a new employee?
7 days in their first year, once they’ve worked for you at least 3 months, rising by 1 day each subsequent year up to a cap of 14 days from the eighth year onward. Employees who haven’t completed a full year get a pro-rated amount.
How much sick leave is an employee entitled to?
Up to 14 days of outpatient sick leave and 60 days of hospitalisation leave a year once they’ve served 6 months or more — the hospitalisation pool includes the outpatient days already used, not on top of them.
How many weeks of maternity leave must I provide?
16 weeks if the child is a Singapore citizen and other Government-Paid Maternity Leave conditions are met, or 12 weeks under the standard Employment Act provision otherwise — both require at least 3 continuous months of service before the birth.
How much paternity leave do fathers get in Singapore?
Up to 4 weeks of Government-Paid Paternity Leave for children born on or after 1 April 2025; 2 mandatory weeks plus 2 optional weeks for children born before that date.
What is Shared Parental Leave?
Additional leave parents can split between them, on top of maternity and paternity leave — 6 weeks for children born between 1 April 2025 and 31 March 2026, rising to 10 weeks for children born on or after 1 April 2026.
How much childcare leave must I give?
6 days a year for a Singapore-citizen child under 7 (2 days for a non-citizen child), plus 2 further days a year for a Singapore-citizen child aged 7 to 12 — combined paid childcare leave across both schemes is capped at 6 days a year per parent.
How many public holidays are there in Singapore?
11 gazetted public holidays a year, plus Polling Day in years with an election. Employees covered by the Employment Act are entitled to paid leave on each one, subject to attendance rules around the adjacent working days.
What happens if I don’t provide statutory leave correctly?
MOM investigates employee complaints about leave and salary breaches and publicly lists employers convicted under the Employment Act. MOM does not publish a specific fine schedule for leave violations, but non-compliance carries prosecution risk and reputational cost.
Last verified: 10 September 2026
WorkRightSG provides general information only. Nothing on this site constitutes legal advice. For advice specific to your situation, consult a qualified employment lawyer or contact the Ministry of Manpower directly.